


Quaint

by kathkin



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-18
Updated: 2015-04-18
Packaged: 2018-03-24 15:27:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3773785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathkin/pseuds/kathkin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>'Oh no,' thought Zoe. 'I've broken him. And we were having such a nice afternoon.'</i> Zoe defines 'bisexuality' for Jamie, prompting a difficult realisation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quaint

“And I _know_ you know what germs are,” Zoe went on, “so really, there’s no excuse to – Jamie, are you even listening to me?”

Jamie’s gaze, which had long since wandered away, turned sharply back towards her. “Eh? Oh, aye. I mean, I am. I mean, I was. I got distracted.” He looked sheepish. “Sorry.”

They were in one of those quaint coastal English towns that had long been swallowed up by the urban conglomerate in Zoe’s time, seated on the promenade, at a white wooden table near the low sea-wall, eating scones and jam. The Doctor had insisted on going swimming, even though it wasn’t swimming weather. Zoe had been in the midst of explaining to Jamie why swimming in the frigid water, thought inadvisable, would not cause the Doctor to ‘catch cold’.

Zoe rolled her eyes. “What’s more interesting than me?”

Jamie gestured vaguely down the beach. “Pretty lassies,” he admitted.

Zoe rolled her eyes again, and looked. There were two young women in those ridiculous all-encompassing bathing suits standing on the pebbly beach. She couldn’t really say if they were pretty at that distance, and they were very covered up. Even if she were to concede ‘pretty lassies’ as a reasonable cause for distraction, they were not, to her eyes, sufficient to distract. “Really? Them?”

“Aye, well what would you know about it?” Jamie shifted defensively. “You’re a girl.” He turned away from the table, craning his neck. “Where’s he got to?”

“Hmm?” Zoe followed his gaze. They’d been able to spy the Doctor at his swimming through a gap between two bathing houses, but now he’d vanished. “He’ll turn up. What’s that supposed to mean?”

Jamie blinked. “Eh?”

“Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean I can’t judge.”

“It’s nae the same.” He twisted his head to watch them two women climb the steps of their bathing house.

Zoe stared at him. It dawned upon her that he thought she was heterosexual. Which was awfully presumptive of him. Honestly, he’d had such a close-minded upbringing. “I do like girls, you know.”

That, at last, got his attention. His head snapped about face. “Do you mean like as in –”

“I mean like as in the way you like girls,” Zoe said before he could stumble on.

Jamie stared at her. “Oh.”

“Oh,” Zoe repeated. She raised her tea to her lips, relishing the warmth. The breeze off the sea could be biting.

Jamie drummed his fingers upon the back of his wooden chair. “I didn’t think you were – that way.”

Zoe pondered asking him to clarify what he meant by _that way_. She elected not to bother. She would clarify things herself. “I’m bisexual.”

“You’re what?” he said, sounding truly baffled.

“Bisexual,” Zoe repeated. “I like boys and girls,” she went on, which was a simplistic definition, but would do for Jamie.

“Ohh,” said Jamie. “So you’re only sort of that way.”

“If you like.” Zoe blew on her tea and sipped. Jamie took up a jar and began to pile jam onto his plate.

“D’you mind,” he said at length. “Can I ask –”

“Ask what you want,” said Zoe. “I don’t care.”

“Have you ever – with a girl?”

“That’s a very personal question,” said Zoe, though she didn’t really mind.

“I was just _asking_ ,” Jamie grumbled.

“I don’t mind.” She wondered if she ought to answer. “No. I haven’t.”

Jamie’s brow crinkled. “Then how do you know?”

“Pardon?”

“How d’you know you like girls?”

Zoe stared at him. What an astonishingly stupid question. It was going to call for an equally stupid answer, and it took her some time to arrive at one. “Well,” she said. “How do you know you like girls?”

Jamie shrugged. “I’ve been with girls.” He bit into his scone.

“I’ve never been with a boy either,” Zoe pointed out.

“Spose,” Jamie conceded. “But that’s different.”

“How so?” Jamie shrugged. Zoe sighed in exasperation. Warming her hands on her tea, she tried to think how to explain herself. “Alright,” she said at length. “You look at girls, don’t you? I look at girls and think they’re attractive, the same as with boys.”

Jamie stared at her, his face a picture of confusion. Then a look of comprehension dawned, and until he spoke she thought she’d made progress. “Oh aye, that,” he said. “Everyone does _that_.” He took a bite of scone and talked around it. “Just because you look at girls sometimes doesn’t mean you’re that way. Everyone does it. It doesnae mean anything.” He swallowed his mouthful.

Zoe stared at him, munching happily on his scone. Several times she began to speak and thought better of it. Ought she to burst his bubble? He seemed so cosy in it.

At length, choosing her words very carefully, she said, “Jamie, I don’t think straight men typically look at other men and think that they’re attractive.”

Jamie shot her a look, evidently startled that she hadn’t dropped the subject. “What would you know about it?”

“I suppose I’ve never asked one,” Zoe admitted, “but straight women certainly don’t look at women that way.”

“Aye, well, mibbe it’s different for men,” Jamie said.

“Maybe,” said Zoe, dubious. “I don’t see why it would be.”

Jamie gave her a hard look. “What’re you getting at?”

“I’m not really getting at anything,” said Zoe. “I suppose I’m just saying that no, everyone doesn’t do that.”

Understanding was starting to trickle into Jamie’s expression. She had the sense that he was only just then listening to what she was saying. He set down his scone and sat back in his chair, rubbing a hand over his mouth. His gaze shifted away from her, drifting vaguely towards the sea. For long moments he was dead silent. _Oh no_ , thought Zoe. I’ve broken him. _And we were having such a nice afternoon._

It was the look on his face that made things finally click into place for Zoe. Up until then, she’d been vaguely assuming that his lack of understanding came from a place of not being terribly bright, rather than, as was suddenly very clear to her, from a place of skin-crawling discomfort with the subject at hand. It wasn’t that he couldn’t understand. He could understand just fine. He was just trying not to.

Of course, she was aware that there’d been a time when people like her were widely discriminated against, but only in the sense that she was aware of a time when people thought the sun moved around the earth. It was one of those things she only thought of in a didn’t-people-use-to-be-fascinatingly-stupid context. It did not, until that moment, occur to her that Jamie, with his barmy ideas about what women should and should not do, must logically have grown up in just such a time. Her vaguely defined history was his concrete reality.

She’d never bothered to wonder what it would be like to be, as Jamie so eloquently put it, _that way_ in a time when the rest of the world hated you for it.

She floundered for words. “I suppose,” she said eventually, “I suppose it would depend how you were looking, though. I mean, there’s a difference between looking at someone and thinking they look nice the way you’d look at a painting or something like that, and looking at someone and thinking they’re attractive. Do you know what I mean?”

Jamie was silent for a few seconds longer. At great length and very slowly, he nodded. “Aye. I know what you mean.” She heard him exhale deeply, as if he’d been holding his breath for a long time. “I look at boys the way I look at girls. I look at them both the same.”

“Oh,” said Zoe. What else was she supposed to say? _Sorry for pulling the rug out from under you, I’m sure it’ll be for the best in the long run?_

He took his hand away from his mouth at last. “What the hell does that mean?” he said. “Does that mean I’m – what you said?”

“I don’t think it’s really my place to tell you what it means,” said Zoe after a little consideration. Jamie nodded, mildly disappointed but clearly understanding. He still had that look in his eyes, a sort of hunted look, as if he expected a trap to spring closed around him any moment. “It’s alright,” she said. It felt like such an odd thing to say – of course it was alright, why would anyone ever doubt it? But she had an inkling that it was the right thing to say.

“Oh, aye?” he said.

“Of course it’s alright,” Zoe said. “Nobody cares where I’m from.”

“Really?” His chair creaked as he sat forward, returning to his cooling scones. He didn’t sound especially shocked. In fact, where it not for the context she’d think him disinterested.

Zoe considered further, and shrugged. “Well, I suppose there _are_ people who care,” she said. “But no-one important listens to them.” Jamie looked at her for a moment, then grunted and bit into his scone. “I take it things are a bit different where you’re from.”

She said it flippantly, not expecting the response she got. “Aye, well, where I’m from men who are that way get strung up.”

Zoe stared at him, truly shocked. “That’s.” She struggled for the right words. “That’s barbaric.”

“Aye, ‘spose it is,” Jamie agreed. “I never really questioned it.” He chewed slowly, and swallowed. “You just don’t talk about it.”

There were a lot of things she wanted to say to that, but the Doctor was always telling her not to judge earth’s history too harshly. There was invariably context that she didn’t – couldn’t – fully understand. Mentally she put the matter aside. “Sorry if I’ve upset you.”

“It’s alright,” said Jamie. “You didn’t. Actually explains a fair bit.” He slid his spoon into his mouth and sucked sugary tea off it. Withdrawing it, he said, “what was the word you used?”

“Bisexual?” Zoe guessed. She’d used a lot of words in the past few minutes, but that was probably the one he meant.

“Aye, that,” he said. “That’s a big word.”

“I like having a big word,” said Zoe.

Jamie pulled a face. “’Spose.” He opened his mouth, she thought probably to ask another question, but he was interrupted by a sudden bluster of noise and movement.

“Water’s lovely! Have you not finished your tea?” The Doctor was standing beside their table, bedraggled, his coat hanging over his arm. “My goodness.” He tugged at his wet collar.

“Och, careful,” said Jamie, swatting him away. “You’re dripping all over everything.”

“Sorry, Jamie.” The Doctor drew up a chair from a nearby table, threw his coat over the back of it, and sat down to pour himself some tea. “Are you sure you won’t take a swim?”

“Are you joking?” said Jamie.

“It’s freezing,” said Zoe.

“It’s bracing,” said the Doctor firmly. “Good for you.”

“Och, you’ll catch cold,” said Jamie.

Zoe narrowed her eyes, trying to detect a trace of irony, but his expression was earnest as ever. She thunked her tea cup down into its saucer. “No, he will _not_ ,” she exclaimed. “You didn’t listen to a word I said, did you?”

Jamie sat back in his chair and spread his hands, exhaling slowly as if he was ever so put upon, which did not dissuade Zoe. She glared at him. The Doctor looked from one to the other with interest. “Have I missed something?”

“No,” said Zoe.

“Nothing interesting,” said Jamie. He passed the Doctor the sugar bowl without being asked.

“Thank you,” said the Doctor. “It’s just an expression, Zoe,” he said as he spooned sugar into his tea. She scowled at him. “But you really _can’t_ catch cold that way, Jamie.”

“Och, I _know_ that,” said Jamie. “I _was_ listening,” he said to Zoe. “Mostly.” The look in his eyes was so plaintive that Zoe couldn’t help but soften.

“Take us somewhere warmer and we’ll go swimming with you,” she said.

“Alright,” said the Doctor, sipping his tea.

“And we’ll hold you tae that,” Jamie added.

“Then I shall hold you to it,” the Doctor said. “Now, who’s for cake?”


End file.
